Abandonment
by ofarrogant
Summary: Lord Marchmain leaves his wife. Movie and book based.


_Disclaimer: I do not own either the novel or the movie or any of the characters. _

_" 'Then I went away-I left her in the chapel praying. __It was hers. It was the place for her.__ I never came back to disturb her prayers. __They said we were fighting for freedom; I had my own victory. Was it a crime?' "_-Evelyn Waugh, Brideshead Revisited

It was the eve of his departure; his last night at home before he was to join the ranks of the soldiers who were fighting in the war; his last night in the safety of his own bed-and he couldn't wait to get away. The children, all four of them ranging from thirteen-year-old Bridey to three-year-old Cordelia, were tucked into bed and the servants had been dismissed for the evening, leaving himself and his wife the only souls awake in the entire household.

He perched on the edge of their bed, a robe thrown over his pajamas, watching her in silence as she sat in a chair before her vanity, running a brush, gilded in pure silver, through each section of hair from the root to tip, mentally counting each stroke. For perhaps the first time during their fifteen years of marriage, he began to take full notice of his wife.

She was not yet thirty-seven, but her dark hair was already starting to turn as silver as that brush in tiny streaks. Her face-composed of high cheekbones, a slender nose, full lips, round cornflower blue eyes-was still as lovely as the day they had met, and just as untouched by the artificiality of makeup. The silk material of the dressing gown she wore over her nightgown sloped artfully across her narrow shoulders, falling in folds around her waist and hips, which were still fairly slim after four pregnancies. A thin gold chain hung from around her neck, a tiny cross resting just below the crook of her throat and above the rise of her breasts.

It was the cross that his eyes fixated on, stared at, as it rose and fell steadily with each breath she took, the metal shining against her skin as the dim light reflected off it. This was the last night he would spend with his wife for a year or more, he should have taken her in his arms and kissed her, made love to her, but he couldn't. The sight of that minute cross, that small symbol of her unwavering faith, paralyzed him.

There had been a time when he had converted to Catholicism, a branch of Christianity that his family had long since cast aside, because it was the only way he could marry her. He had thrown himself willingly into learning the ways of the Roman Catholic Church because he wanted to make her happy; to see the smile that he loved so much light up her face. Above all else, he had wanted to prove his love for her in the best way he knew how.

But as the years went by, his love had started to wane as her love for her God only grew stronger. The romantic illusions of perfection had vanished and he had started to see the flaws in her character as only someone who was falling out of love could. She was morally self-righteous, pious in the extreme, and he had slowly begun to realize that the only way she knew how to love another human being was to see to the preserving of their immortal soul. She was utterly incapable of understanding any other way of life.

These realizations were what had instigated the steady turning of his back on both her and her religion. He had begun to grow more and more unhappy; more cynical about everything she believed so firmly in. He no longer wanted anything to do with the Catholic Church, which he had begun to see as nothing more than a controlling force that, if given as much influence as she had allowed it to have, could ruin rather than save a person. For the past several years he had lived in a perpetual state of suffocation, and he couldn't help but be a tad grateful for this war that was going to grant him the chance to breathe again.

Her voice, quiet and forceful, brought him out of his thoughts. "I'll pray for you every day while you're gone," she murmured, setting down the brush and turning in her chair to face him, her expression, as always, one of utmost calm.

"I don't want your prayers, Teresa," he shot back through gritted teeth, his ire starting to rise at the very thought of her kneeling before the altar with his name on her lips.

She was silent for a long moment, not reacting, before finally asking, "Will you miss me at all, Alex?"

"How can one ever know who they'll miss until they're already gone?" He answered vaguely, for all his loathing of everything she stood for unable to fully admit his desire to get as far away from her as possible.

An understanding of sorts flickered in her eyes, as if she had gotten the underlying message loud and clear despite the ambiguity of the response, but faded as quickly as it had come. "Will you at least allow Father Mackay to bless you tomorrow morning before you leave?" She wheedled, unable to stop herself from once again being heedless in regard to his aversion to her faith.

"I'd rather be damned than accept that man's blessing!" He retorted passionately, his hands curling into fists at his sides as if he was fighting the urge to strike something.

"I wish I could understand where all this hatred was coming from," she murmured, dropping her gaze to her hands, which were folded in her lap. "It's self-destructive, Alex."

Something within him snapped, then, and his eyes were flashing as he rose to glower down at her hatefully. "I'll tell you what's self-destructive, Teresa," he countered, his voice sharp and resentful. "Being self-destructive is allowing some omniscient being that you'll _never see with your own two eyes_ run your life through a conduit that's sole purpose is to make itself rich off of the fears of others!"

"Blasphemy," she declared as she met his eyes again, crossing herself briefly before bringing her hand down to rest on top of the cross that still rested against her collarbone. "You should go at once to the chapel and pray for God's forgiveness, but since you won't, I'll have to do it for you."

"Don't waste your time," he sneered coldly, heading for the doors, unable to bear this argument for a moment longer. "My soul's _far_ from worth saving!"

"Where are you going?"

"Somewhere I can get a decent night's rest without having you pick apart my moral conscience!" He snapped, slamming the heavy doors shut behind him as he stormed out of the room. Those were the last words he ever said to her face-to-face.

The following morning, the children were waiting for him in the foyer as he prepared to leave. He paused in the doorway to look at the dark-haired foursome: all of them were still in their nightclothes; Bridey shifting awkwardly from foot to foot, holding little Cordelia, who was sucking her thumb, by the hand; Sebastian and Julia, the two middle children as well as the two closest in age, clinging to each other as if for support. Their mother was nowhere in sight.

"Don't look so glum," he told them as he approached, swinging his equipment off of his shoulder and setting it down on the floor. "It's hardly my funeral and it's not going to be for some time. Your old man is far too ornery to let some silly war get the better of him."

"Do you really have to go, Papa?" Sebastian questioned, his dark eyes glittering a little with tears that he was valiantly trying to fight back.

"It's my duty as an Englishman, my dear boy," he responded, resting a gentle hand on his youngest son's shoulder. Out of all the children, he had always felt closer to Sebastian, perhaps because even though the boy was only ten-years-old, he saw a lot of himself in him. "We need to protect what's ours from those blasted Germans."

"We'll all miss you, Papa," Julia added quietly, her eyes dry but full of emotion. "You'll write, won't you?"

"Of course, Julia," he said, the answer tasting somewhat bitter because the only correspondence that he intended to send out was the occasional note to let them know that he was still alive. Any other would require actual conversation with his wife. He then glanced once at the clock on the wall and moved to pick up his things again. "Well, it's time for me to go."

"Aren't you going to say goodbye to Mummy?" Julia piped up again. "She's in the chapel."

He hesitated momentarily, his hand freezing a few inches above the strap of his bag, before he decisively swung it back up over his shoulder. "We've already said our goodbyes," he finally murmured, unable to set foot in that place that he had built for her out of love so many years ago. "It'll be up to you to help her with things, Bridey," he added, patting his eldest, his heir, on the shoulder. "You're the man of the house now."

"Yes, Father," Bridey responded tonelessly, although he looked somewhat uncomfortable with the responsibility that had just been hoisted upon him.

Cordelia looked up at him then, still sucking on her thumb, too young to fully understand what was going on. This allowed him a sense of detachment that he hadn't been able to have upon saying goodbye to the others, and he only smiled slightly at her, bending down to her level, "Be a good girl, sweetheart. You have your brothers and sister to look after you, not to mention your mother; you don't need your old man."

"I love you, Papa," was all she said, releasing Bridey's hand to wrap her small arms around her father, hugging him.

"I love you too, Cordelia," he responded, patting the back of her head lightly, perhaps not meaning it as much he should, before gently removing her arms and straightening up. "I expect you all to take care of each other now," he added, knowing they would all need the emotional support from each other that they would never receive from their mother. "Can you do that for me?"

"Yes," the three oldest chorused while Cordelia went back to sucking her thumb, staring up at her father in silence.

He patted them each on the head one last time before murmuring, "Then this is goodbye," before adjusting his equipment and walking out of the house, not pausing to glance back even once as he climbed into the waiting car. He stared straight ahead as the car started down the long drive, feeling as if a burden had been lifted a little more from his shoulders with each turn of the wheels that took him farther away from his wife.

The war lasted three more years after he had joined the troops, spending a majority of the last year stationed in Italy, and by the time it had ended, he had known that he could never go back home. The freedom he had found from the oppression that had been inflicted upon him for years by his wife and the Catholic Church had proved to be intoxicating. This, in turn, made the idea of returning to the endless suffocation completely unbearable.

Then there was the fact that he had met a charming, charismatic dancer while in Italy, which only gave him another excuse to stay away. Her name was Cara, and even if he wasn't actually in love with her, she was, at the very least, his wife's polar opposite, which made her the most suitable companion that he could've hoped for. They settled into a palazzo in Venice, the city where they had met, as soon as he was released from duty, and it was from there that he penned a note to his wife admitting his betrayal:

_Teresa-_

_When you shortly begin to see those English soldiers that have survived returning home from the battlefield, I will not be among them. I am not injured, nor am I being detained by anything other than a selfish desire to remain away from you. _

_Before the war had even ended, I had realized that I could never be happy returning home to England. I've found solace in the distance that's been put between us; a sense of peace that I could never have when with you. Call me a selfish man, as I've already admitted to being, but I cannot relinquish the happiness that I have found, and I would rather kill myself than to return to our old way of life. _

_There is something else I must admit, for I have no desire to lead you on in any way, and that is that I have met someone else. She is an Italian, a dancer, who I became acquainted with while stationed in Venice, and we are, even as I write this, already living together. I do not say this while suffering under any delusion that you'll grant me a divorce, but just so that you know better than to think that I'll return home as soon as the novelty of this experience wears off. _

_I do also realize that by penning this letter, I've obliterated any right I might have otherwise had concerning custody of the children. But, to continue in this blunt fashion, I, at this moment in time, have little desire to be a part of their lives. I'd see you in everything they would do, every word they would speak, every glance they'd direct my way, and because of this I could never love them the way a father should for I have not even a semblance of affection left for you. _

_I'll leave it to you to explain to them what has transpired between us, even though I have no doubt that in your tale I will turn out to be some heartless fiend. Perhaps in a few years time, I will be able to get past my bitterness towards you enough to seek them out again, but for now I'll keep my distance and, somewhat regretfully, leave them at your mercy, which will hopefully prove kinder to them than it ever had to me. _

_-Alexander-_

The letter reached her two weeks to the day after its shipment, slipped in among invitations and well-wishes, and, perhaps because deep inside she knew what it would say, she didn't open it until she was alone that evening in the room that they had once shared. The paper unfolded smoothly underneath her slender fingers, her eyes scanning the coldly scribbled words in silence. Her composed expression did not waver even once as she perused the contents of the letter, the confession of her husband's infidelity, and once she had finished, she only folded it back up again and set it down on her vanity.

Several minutes passed of numb stillness before her eyelids fluttered compulsively as she forced them shut against the tears that were threatening to fall; a tingling sensation in her throat betraying the impending release of the muffled sob before it had even crossed her lips. All at once, the tears escaped, the sobs could no longer be held back, and she was left burying her face in her shaking arms. It was the first and last time that she wept over her husband's willful abandonment.

End


End file.
